Professor Kristy Muir

Chief Executive Officer

BA Hons, PhD, GAICD

Professor Kristy Muir is the CEO of the Centre for Social Impact (CSI), a Professor of Social Policy at UNSW Sydney and an elected member of UNSW Sydney’s Council. She has worked for more than two decades with for-purpose organisations to help understand, measure, and find innovative solutions to complex social problems.

Kristy has undertaken dozens of projects with many government, not-for-profit, corporate, and philanthropic organisations to help improve social impact. Her research, which has attracted more than $11 million in funding, has focused on children, young people, families and communities and spans many social domains (e.g. education, employment and social participation, wellbeing, disability, mental health, financial resilience). She has published widely in policy, sociology, social work, history and public health journals and in publicly accessible and popular media, such as TEDx, The Mandarin, The Guardian and The Conversation.

Kristy has strong leadership and management expertise, is an excellent communicator and public speaker, and is able to diagnose problems, identify key issues and work collaboratively to make progress. She asks and seeks answers to difficult questions like: How do we increase our social impact? Why are we so stuck? Why are services, supports and policies so fragmented? How might we work innovatively to find, measure, and understand solutions for complex social problems?

In 2013, Kristy won the UNSW Staff Excellence Award for Senior Leadership. She was formerly the Research Director at CSI (2013-15), the Associate Dean Research for the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences (2011-13) and the Director of the Disability Studies and Research Centre (2009-2010) at UNSW Sydney. She has a PhD in social history, is a graduate of the AICD and, prior to joining academia, worked in the not-for-profit sector.

Muir K; Mullan K; Powell A; Flaxman S; Thompson DA; Griffiths MJ, 2009, State of Australia's young people: a report on the social, economic, health and family lives of young people, Social Policy Research Centre, Sydney, Reports

Sawrikar P; Griffiths MJ; Muir K, 2008, Culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) young people and mentoring : the case of Horn of African young people in Australia, Commonwealth of Australia, Canberra, Culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) young people and mentoring : the case of Horn of African young people in Australia, Reports

Muir K, 2008, Family resilience where families have a child (0-8 years) with a disability: literature review, Social Policy and Research Centre, UNSW, Sydney, SPRC Report, SPRC Report 9/08, Reports

Muir K; Boot R, 2005, Working towards digital and social inclusion with community technology learning centres: an evaluation of The Smith Family?s involvement in Microsoft Unlimited Potential, The Smith Family, Sydney, It takes a community to bridge a divide :working towards digital and social inclusion with community technology learning centres, Reports

Muir K, 2004, Connecting Communities with CTLCs: from the digital divide to social inclusion, The Smith Family, Sydney, Connecting communities with CTLCs : from the digital divide to social inclusion, Reports

Muir K; Tudball J, 2008, 'Family resilience in families where a young child has a disability', in , presented at Families Through Life, 10th Australian Institute of Family Studies Conference, Melbourne, Australia, 9 - 11 July 2008

Sawrikar P; Griffiths MJ; Muir K, 2008, 'Mentoring for Horn of African young people in Australia', in , presented at Association of Children?s Welfare Agencies Conference and the 2008 Management and Leadership Institute, Sydney, Australia, 18 - 20 August 2008

Muir K; Fisher KR; Abello D; Dadich A, 2007, 'Challenging the disabling nature of mental illness: the evaluation results of the Housing and Accommodation Support Initiative (HASI)', in , presented at Australian Social Policy Conference 2007, University of New South Wales, 11 - 13 July 2007

Sawrikar P; Muir K, 'The myth of a ?fair go?: Barriers to sport and recreational participation among Indian and other ethnic minority women in Australia', in , presented at , http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.smr.2010.01.005